13 November 2016 Events

British printers leave mark on book awards

British book printing earns its place with success on 2016 book production awards.

British printers have scooped more titles in the British Book Design & Production Awards for 2016. Not so many years ago, so many winning books were printed in Italy, Hong kong and elsewhere that a category a British printer must win – best British book – was introduced. Now UK printers have won of the awards, including the Book of the Year, almost half the 19 categories.

This was the Folio Society’s anniversary edition of Alice in Wonderland produced by Smith Settle Printing and Bookbinding in Leeds, with Logan Press producing the end papers and Napier Jones responsible for illustrations. Just 1,000 copies were produced, highlighting another theme. Publishing is becoming a shorter run game, which suits UK production better than than the far east.

The judges’ comments on the winning book highlight the aim of the awards: “No detail has been left as standard, every element in creating this book has been endowed with the highest specification, all adding a subtle and flattering backdrop to Carroll’s classic story.”

The Folio Society had earlier picked up the Brand Series award for Folio Collectables, but this had been printed in Germany by Kösel. It was the only category win for a German printer, compared to two for Pureprint (Digitally Printed books and Trade Illustrated) and two for CPI Books (Best Jacket and Literature). Other British winners were Northland Creative Services (Limited edition); Generation Press (Self-published books); Clays (Interactive Multimedia books); Push Print (Photographic books).

The most successful printer in terms of short listed mentions was Chinese printer C&C Printing with nine listings. The leading UK printer was CPI with five mentions.

The five judges had to sort 566 submissions though disappointing there is no commentary in the Book of the Night detailing the winners and produced by Boss Print, the equal of any of the books that had been judged.

The presentation had kicked off with Charles Jarrold, chief executive of organiser BPIF, celebrating the continuing success of printed books. “The book industry might have been insecure a few years ago,” he said. “12 months ago I reported research from Deloittes that readers had reached 20% of the market and that is still the case, and that ebooks have declined 2% to around 17%.”

Guest of honour and presenter Baroness Floella Benjamin enthused about books she had read, the impact books had had and those she had read as a presenter on Play School and other children’s programmes and those she had judged as one of the panellists of the Smarties Book Award.

The Folio Society receive award

The Folio Society scooped the Book of the Year award at the British Book Design & Print awards last week for a 150th anniversary edition of Alice in Wonderland. The edition, limited to 1,000 copies, was produced by Smith Settle Printing and Binding in Leeds. Overall it was a good night for British printers winning nine of the award categories.